A response to "Ain't That Good News?"

The Daily Review Atlas (DRA) doesn't post its op-ed page online, so in fairness to the good people who think nobody in my town disagrees with me, ever, I thought I might share a rebuttal, today. Yesterday evening's DRA print edition ran a letter in response to my column from last Friday, in which I simply listed a few pieces of good news which seemed to have slipped past the MSM. The response:

Mainstream Media

Editor,

After reading Rebekah Kloeppel’s guest column in Saturday’s (sic) Review Atlas, I know now what length a stupid person will go to prove their point! This article, entitled, “Ain’t that good news?” provides proof positive that slanted news coverage is not the product of what she calls “the mainstream media.”

I suggest that instead of wasting half a page to print stupidity, this newspaper woud be better off extending their comic section. According to this article, we are winnning the war in Iraq because somehow we lucked out and killed Abu Azzam, the man who is considered to be second in command of the terrorist organization now operating in Iraq. Men like Abu Azzam within the network of terrorists currently working in Iraq are like Kleenex tissues - when one is pulled anothe pops up. Ms. Kloeppel apparently believes that by killling Abu Azzam, it has disrupted the terorist system operating in Iraq. I suggest that she should occasionally turn on her TV or listen to her radio before passing such absurd judgment. If we are to believe her analysis of why anyone would blow themselves up becasue they are promised virgins, then the women who have participated in this type of suicide mission must be lesbians and therefore expendable.

If Ms. Kloeppel’s distorted comments about Iraq weren’t bad enough, the second half of this column dealt with her analysis of the hurricanes recently in the gulf states of Louisiana and Mississippi, and she was quick to point out that, according to her, “our huricane warning system works, when people heed it.” Apparently she failed to realize that the hurricane had the audacity to come in between paydays for many people on fixed incomes, or before welfare checks arrived. Hate to tell you this, Ms. Kloeppel, but to the poor living in the 9th ward in New Orleans along with others throughout that city, people living on fixed incomes most times do not have cars or even money for gasoline half way through the month. I am sure that it is difficult for someone like Rebekah Kloeppel to understand the plight of the poor, but maybe she should take some sensitivity training. She argued that the National Guard and FEMA applied “unprecedented” speed in responding to all regions where they were requested. Further, she claimed that “they were in place, doing their jobs, almost 20 percent faster than they had done after last summer’s series of stormas hit Florida!” It certainly begs one to wonder at her reasoning, since most of us saw people living in attics and on roof tops for four days after the disaster. I don’t know about you, but as for me, I was totally embarrassed at the inability of FEMA to do anything for four or five days after New Orleans was swamped.

So.... Rebekah Kloeppel, I think I will believe the mainstream media over your rather distorted view of what is happening in the world.

Respectfully,
Wendall Stivers,
Monmouth

I can respect a man who doesn't believe everything he sees in the newspapers.


Suggested reading:Michael Yon : Online Magazine: The Battle For Mosul IV, Reuters' account (MSM) of # of possible fatalities in wake of Katrina,Thanks, Germany!,Jack Kelly: No shame", junkyard blog: Mayor Nagin Memorial Motor Pool, political teen: Blanco admits error on camera